FUNCTIONS ,OPERATORS,DATE_TIME

LAB MANUAL
Oracle Built in Functions

There are two types of functions in Oracle.

1) Single Row Functions: Single row or Scalar functions return a value for every row that is
processed in a query.

2) Group Functions: These functions group the rows of data based on the values returned by
the query. This is discussed in SQL GROUP Functions. The group functions are used to
calculate aggregate values like total or average, which return just one total or one average value
after processing a group of rows.

There are four types of single row functions. They are:

Numeric Functions: These are functions that accept numeric input and return numeric values

Character or Text Functions: These are functions that accept character input and can return
both character and number values.

Date Functions: These are functions that take values that are of datatype DATE as input and
return values of datatype DATE, except for the MONTHS_BETWEEN function, which returns a
number.

Conversion Functions: These are functions that help us to convert a value in one form to
another form. For Example: a null value into an actual value, or a value from one datatype to
another datatype like NVL, TO_CHAR, TO_NUMBER, TO_DATE etc.
You can combine more than one function together in an expression. This is known as nesting of
functions.

What is a DUAL Table in Oracle? This is a single row and single column dummy table
provided by oracle. This is used to perform mathematical calculations without using a table.

Select * from DUAL

Output:
DUMMY
X

Select 777 * 888 from Dual

Output:
777 * 888
689976

1) Numeric Functions:
Numeric functions are used to perform operations on numbers. They accept numeric values as
input and return numeric values as output. Few of the Numeric functions are:

Function Name Return Value

ABS (x) Absolute value of the number 'x'
CEIL (x) Integer value that is Greater than or equal to
FLOOR (x) the number 'x'
TRUNC (x, y) Integer value that is Less than or equal to the
ROUND (x, y) number 'x'
Truncates value of number 'x' up to 'y'
decimal places
Rounded off value of the number 'x' up to
the number 'y' decimal places

The following examples explains the usage of the above numeric functions

Function Name Example Return Value

s
ABS (x) 1 -1
CEIL (x) ABS (1) ABS (-1) 3 3 -1
FLOOR (x) CEIL (2.83) CEIL (2.49) CEIL (-
1.6) 2 2 -2
TRUNC (x, y) FLOOR (2.83) FLOOR (2.49)
FLOOR (-1.6) 140.23 54
ROUND (x, y) TRUNC (140.234, 2) TRUNC (-
125.4 125 120
54, 1)
ROUND (125.456, 1) ROUND
(125.456, 0) ROUND (124.456,
-1)

SELECT ROUND (unit_price) FROM product;

2) Character or Text Functions:

Character or text functions are used to manipulate text strings. They accept strings or characters as
input and can return both character and number values as output.
Few of the character or text functions are as given below:
 Function Name Return Value
LOWER (string_value) All the letters in 'string_value'is converted to
UPPER (string_value) lowercase.

INITCAP (string_value) All the letters in 'string_value'is converted to

uppercase.

LTRIM (string_value, trim_text) All the letters in 'string_value'is converted to

mixed case.

All occurrences of 'trim_text' is removed

from the left of'string_value'.

RTRIM (string_value, trim_text) All occurrences of 'trim_text'from the left and

right of'string_value' ,

TRIM (trim_text FROM

'trim_text' can also be only one character long .
string_value)

SUBSTR (string_value, m, n) Returns 'n' number of characters from

'string_value'starting from the 'm' position.

Number of characters in'string_value' in

LENGTH (string_value) returned.

Returns 'string_value' left-padded with

LPAD (string_value, n, pad_value) 'pad_value' . The length of the whole string will
be of 'n' characters

Returns 'string_value' right-padded with

RPAD (string_value, n, pad_value)
'pad_value' . The length of the whole string will
be of 'n' characters.

For Example, we can use the above UPPER () text function with the column value as follows.

SELECT UPPER (product_name) FROM product;

The following examples explains the usage of the above character or text functions

Function Name Examples Return Value

LOWER(string_value) LOWER('Good Morning') good morning

UPPER(string_value) UPPER('Good Morning') GOOD MORNING
INITCAP(string_value) INITCAP('GOOD MORNING') Good Morning
LTRIM(string_value, trim_text) LTRIM ('Good Morning', Morning
'Good)
RTRIM (string_value, RTRIM ('Good Morning', ' Good
trim_text) Morning')

TRIM (trim_text FROM TRIM ('o' FROM 'Good Gd Mrning

string_value) Morning')

SUBSTR (string_value, m, n) SUBSTR ('Good Morning', 6, 7) Morning

LENGTH LENGTH ('Good Morning') 12

LPAD (string_value, n, LPAD ('Good', 6, '*') **Good

pad_value)

RPAD (string_value, n,
pad_value) RPAD ('Good', 6, '*') Good**

3) Date Functions:

These are functions that take values that are of datatype DATE as input and return values of
datatypes DATE, except for the MONTHS_BETWEEN function, which returns a number as output.

Few date functions are as given below.

Function Name Return Value

ADD_MONTHS (date, n) Returns a date value after adding 'n' months to
the date'x'.
MONTHS_BETWEEN (x1, x2) Returns the number of months between dates
x1 and x2.

ROUND (x, date_format) Returns the date 'x' rounded off to the nearest
 century, year, month, date, hour, minute, or
second as specified by the'date_format'.

Returns the date 'x' lesser than or equal to the

TRUNC (x, date_format) nearest century, year, month, date, hour,
minute, or second as specified by the
'date_format'.

Returns the next date of the'week_day' on or

NEXT_DAY (x, week_day) after the date'x' occurs.

It is used to determine the number of days

LAST_DAY (x) remaining in a month from the date
'x'specified.

Returns the systems current date and time.

SYSDATE
Returns the date and time in zone2 if date 'x'
NEW_TIME (x, zone1, zone2) represents the time in zone1.

The below table provides the examples for the above functions

Function Name Examples Return Value

ADD_MONTHS ( ) ADD_MONTHS ('16-Sep-81', 16-Dec-81

3)

MONTHS_BETWEEN( ) MONTHS_BETWEEN ('16- 3

Sep-81', '16-Dec-81')

NEXT_DAY( ) NEXT_DAY ('01-Jun-08', 04-JUN-08

'Wednesday')

LAST_DAY( ) LAST_DAY ('01-Jun-08') 30-Jun-08

NEW_TIME( ) NEW_TIME ('01-Jun-08', 31-May-08

'IST', 'EST')

4) Conversion Functions:
These are functions that help us to convert a value in one form to another form. For Ex: a null value
into an actual value, or a value from one datatype to another datatype like NVL, TO_CHAR,
TO_NUMBER, TO_DATE.

Few of the conversion functions available in oracle are:

Function Name Return Value

TO_CHAR (x [,y]) Converts Numeric and Date values to a

character string value. It cannot be used for
calculations since it is a string value.

TO_DATE (x [, date_format]) Converts a valid Numeric and Character values

to a Date value. Date is formatted to the
format specified by 'date_format'.

NVL (x, y) If 'x' is NULL, replace it with 'y'. 'x'and 'y' must
be of the same datatype.

DECODE (a, b, c, d, e, default_value) Checks the value of 'a', if a = b, then returns 'c'.
If a = d, then returns 'e'. Else, returns
default_value

The below table provides the examples for the above functions

Function Name Examples Return Value

TO_CHAR () TO_CHAR (3000, '$9999') $3000 Monday, June 2008

TO_CHAR (SYSDATE, 'Day,
Month YYYY')

TO_DATE () TO_DATE ('01-Jun-08') 01-Jun-08

NVL () NVL (null, 1) 1

Numeric Functions:

These are functions that accept numeric input and return numeric values. Below are few of the
examples
ABS: Absolute value of the number

SELECT ABS (12) FROM DUAL;

ABS (12)
---------

12

CEIL: Integer value that is Greater than or equal to the number

SQL> SELECT CEIL (48.99) FROM DUAL;

CEIL (48.99)
-----------
49
SQL> SELECT CEIL (48.11) FROM DUAL;

CEIL (48.11)
-----------
49
FLOOR: Integer value that is Less than or equal to the number

SQL> SELECT FLOOR (49.99) FROM DUAL;

FLOOR (49.99)
------------
49
SQL> SELECT FLOOR (49.11) FROM DUAL;
FLOOR (49.11)
------------
49

ROUND: Rounded off value of the number 'x' up to the number 'y' decimal places

SQL> SELECT ROUND (49.11321, 2) FROM DUAL;

ROUND (49.11321, 2)
-----------------
49.11

SQL> SELECT ROUND (49.11321, 3) FROM DUAL;

ROUND (49.11321, 3)
-----------------
49.113

SQL> SELECT ROUND (49.11321, 4) FROM DUAL;

ROUND (49.11321, 4)
-----------------
49.1132 Few other functions,
MOD
SQL> SELECT MOD (4, 2) FROM DUAL;
MOD (4, 2)
---------
0
SQL> SELECT SIGN (-98) FROM DUAL;
SIGN (-98)
---------
-1
SQL> SELECT SIGN (98) FROM DUAL;
SIGN (98)
---------
1
Character String:
Function 1: UPPER
Purpose: Returns the string in uppercase
Syntax: UPPER (‘str’)
Example: SELECT UPPER (‘karuvachi’) from Dual;
Output:KARUVACHI
———————————————————————————————-
Function 2: lower
Purpose: Returns the string in lowercase
Syntax: lower (‘str’)
Example: SELECT LOWER (‘KaRuVaChi’) FROM DUAL;
Output:karuvachi
———————————————————————————————-
Function 3: Initcap
Purpose: Returns the string with first letter in uppercase and rest of the letters in lowercase
Syntax: Initcap(‘str’)
Example: SELECT Initcap(‘KaRuVaChi’) FROM DUAL;
Output:Karuvachi
———————————————————————————————-
Function 4: Concat
Purpose: Concatenate two strings
Syntax: concat(‘str1′,’str2’)
Example: SELECT CONCAT (‘Karu’,’Nand’) FROM DUAL;
Output:KaruNand
———————————————————————————————-
Function 5: Lpad
Purpose: Pad in the left side of the string for given times – length of the string
Syntax: Lpad(‘str1′,n,’str2’)
Example: SELECT Lpad(‘Karu’,6,’?’) FROM DUAL;
Output?Karu
———————————————————————————————-
Function 6: Rpad
Purpose: Pad in the right side of the string for given times – length of the string
Syntax: Rpad(‘str1′,n,’str2’)
Example: SELECT Rpad(‘Karu’,6,’?’) FROM DUAL;
Output:Karu??
———————————————————————————————-
Function 7: trim
Purpose: Trim the whitespaces in both the sides of the string
Syntax: trim (‘str’)
Example: SELECT TRIM (‘karu ‘) FROM DUAL;
Output:karu
———————————————————————————————-
Function 8: Ltrim
Purpose: Trim the whitespaces in left the side of the string
Syntax: Ltrim(‘str’)
Example: SELECT LTRIM (‘karu ‘) FROM DUAL;
Output:karu….(. dot are spaces)
———————————————————————————————-

Function 9: Rtrim
Purpose: Trim the whitespaces in right the side of the string
Syntax: Rtrim(‘str’)
Example: SELECT RTRIM (‘ karu ‘) FROM DUAL;
Output….karu(. dot are spaces)
———————————————————————————————-
Function 10: Length
Purpose: length of the string
Syntax: length (‘str’)
Example: SELECT LENGTH (‘karuvachi’) FROM DUAL;
Output:9
———————————————————————————————-
Function 11: Instr
Purpose: Find the position of the string in another string
Syntax: Instr(‘str1′,’str2’)
Example: SELECT INSTR (‘karuvachi’,’ka’) FROM DUAL;
Output:1
———————————————————————————————-
Function 12: substr
Purpose: get a sub string from string
Syntax: substr(‘str’,start_pos,number_of_chars)
Example: SELECT substr(‘karuvachi’,2,4) FROM DUAL;
Output: aruv

Date Functions and Operators.

To see the system date and time use the following functions:

CURRENT_DATE:

Returns the current date in the session time zone, in a value in the Gregorian calendar of datatype
DATE SYSDATE: Returns the current date and time.

SYSTIMESTAMP:

The SYSTIMESTAMP function returns the system date, including fractional

Seconds and time zone of the database.

The return type is TIMESTAMP WITH TIME ZONE.

FORMAT MEANING
D Day of the week
DD Day of the month
DD Day of the year
D Full day for ex. ‘Monday’, ’Tuesday’, ’Wednesday’
DAY Day in three letters for ex. ‘MON’, ‘TUE’,’FRI’
DY
Week of the month

W Week of the year

Month in two digits (1-Jan, 2-Feb,…12-Dec)

WW
MM Month in three characters like “Jan”, ”Feb”, ”Apr”

MON
Full Month like “January”, ”February”, ”April”
Month in Roman Characters (I-XII, I-Jan, II-Feb,…XII-Dec)
MONTH Quarter of the Month
RM Last two digits of the year.
Q Full year
YY Year in words like “Nineteen Ninety Nine”
YYYY Hours in 12 hour format
YEAR Hours in 12 hour format
HH Hours in 24 hour format
HH12 Minutes
HH24 Seconds
MI Fractional Seconds
SS
FF Milliseconds
Julian Day i.e Days since 1st-Jan-4712BC to till-date
SSSSS
J If the year is less than 50 Assumes the year as 21ST
Century. If the year is greater than 50 then assumes the
RR year in 20th Century.
Date and time functions and formats are quite different in various databases. In this article, let’s
review the most common functions that manipulates dates in an Oracle database

The function SYSDATE() returns a 7 byte binary data element whose bytes represents:
 Century,

 Year,

 Month,

 Day,

 Hour,

 Minute,

 Second

Select sysdate from dual;

Oracle enables you to extract the day, month, and year from
a date using an extract function:

 select extract(day from sysdate) as only_day from

dual
 select extract(month from sysdate) as only_month
from dual
 select extract(year from sysdate) as only_year from
dual
ADD_MONTHS (date, n) – Adds the specific number of
months (n) to a date. The ‘n’ can be both negative and
positive:

Select add_months(sysdate, -1) as prev_month , sysdate,

add_months (sysdate, 1) as next_month
from dual

Prev_Month Sysdate Next_Month

LAST_DAY (date) – Returns the last day in the month of the specified date d.

Select sysdate, last_day(sysdate) as last_day_curr_month,

last_day(sysdate) + 1 as first_day_next_month from dual

The number of days until the end of the month.

Select last_day(sysdate) - sysdate as days_left

from dual

MONTHS_BETWEEN(date, date) – Calculates the number of months between two dates.

Example:
select MONTHS_BETWEEN ('31-JAN-2014', '28-FEB-2014')
from dual

select MONTHS_BETWEEN ('31-MAR-2013', '28-FEB-2013')

from dual

Let’s select the number of months an employee has

worked for the company.

Select months_between (sysdate, date_of_hire)

from employees

ROUND(date [, format_mask VARCHAR2]) –

Returns the date with time rounded to midnight (12 A.M.)

in the default. The format mask is optional. The following
example rounds a date to the first day of the following
year:

SELECT ROUND (TO_DATE ('10-SEP-14'),'YEAR') as

new_year FROM DUAL;

Arithmetic Operations with Dates

Date + number

select sysdate + 1 as tomorrow

from dual
select sysdate + (5/1440) as ive_mintues_from_now
from dual

Date – number
select sysdate - 1 as Yesterday
from dual

Implicit Data Type Conversion

A VARCHAR2 or CHAR value can be implicitly converted to NUMBER or DATE type value by Oracle.
Similarly, a NUMBER or DATA type value can be automatically converted to character data by Oracle
server. Note that the impicit interconversion happens only when the character represents the valid
number or date type value respectively.

For example, examine the below SELECT queries. Both the queries will give the same result because
Oracle internally treats 15000 and '15000' as same.

Query-1

SELECT employee_id,first_name,salary
FROM employees
WHERE salary > 15000;

Query-2

SELECT employee_id,first_name,salary
FROM employees
WHERE salary > '15000';

Explicit Data Type Conversion

SQL Conversion functions are single row functions which are capable of typecasting column value,
literal or an expression. TO_CHAR, TO_NUMBER and TO_DATE are the three functions which
perform cross modification of data types.
TO_CHAR function

TO_CHAR function is used to typecast a numeric or date input to character type with a format
model (optional).

Syntax

TO_CHAR(number1, [format], [nls_parameter])

For number to character conversion, nls parameters can be used to specify decimal characters,
group separator, local currency model, or international currency model. It is an optional
specification - if not available, session level nls settings will be used. For date to character
conversion, the nls parameter can be used to specify the day and month names, as applicable.
Dates can be formatted in multiple formats after converting to character types using TO_CHAR
function. The TO_CHAR function is used to have Oracle 11g display dates in a particular format.
Format models are case sensitive and must be enclosed within single quotes.
Consider the below

SELECT query. The query format the HIRE_DATE and SALARY columns of EMPLOYEES table using
TO_CHAR function.

SELECT first_name,
TO_CHAR (hire_date, 'MONTH DD, YYYY') HIRE_DATE,
TO_CHAR (salary, '$99999.99') Salary
FROM employees
WHERE rownum < 5;

The first TO_CHAR is used to convert the hire date to the date format MONTH DD, YYYY i.e. month
spelled out and padded with spaces, followed by the two-digit day of the month, and then the four-
digit year. If you prefer displaying the month name in mixed case (that is, "December"), simply use
this case in the format argument: ('Month DD, YYYY').

The second TO_CHAR function in Figure 10-39 is used to format the SALARY to display the currency
sign and two decimal positions.

TO_NUMBER function

The TO_NUMBER function converts a character value to a numeric datatype. If the string being
converted contains nonnumeric characters, the function returns an error.
Syntax

TO_NUMBER (string1, [format], [nls_parameter])

TO_DATE function

The function takes character values as input and returns formatted date equivalent of the same.
The TO_DATE function allows users to enter a date in any format, and then it converts the entry
into the default format used by Oracle 11g.

Syntax:

TO_DATE( string1, [ format_mask ], [ nls_language ] )